Friday, September 1, 2017

Impalers – The Celestial Dictator

Since their debut record in 2013, Denmark’s
Impalers have been alternating between releasing albums and EPs. It is only
fitting then, that “The Celestial Dictator” is a full-length record. The band’s
growth has been fairly evident throughout the years, as they continue to refine
their songwriting craft. “The Celestial Dictator” marks the band’s best effort
to date, and shows an interesting, albeit divisive set of sounds. Most of
Impalers’ music is pure Kreator worship of the highest order. Think high-speed
thrash that relentlessly beats you over the head with its sheer viciousness,
accompanied by throat-tearing vocals. Occasionally, the band gets a bit more
melodic, particularly with some of the bridge riffs (the one in “Terrestrial
Demise” being one excellent example). They also have no shortage of harmonized leads. Even though there is nothing original
about this style of thrash, Impalers’ execution is perfect, with tracks like
“Terrorborn”, and “Color Me White” being the pinnacle of aggressive thrash. The
latter track is the speediest thing on the record, and puts most other thrash
bands to shame. It opens with a hilarious high-pitched scream that makes
absolute no sense (and thus, is awesome).

“The Celestial Dictator” isn’t quite so
one-sided, however. Impalers are evidently big fans of Metallica, amongst
others, and so many tracks feature clean vocals and lengthy melodic sections.
It’s almost a tale of two records, as tracks are often Kreator worship, or
Metallica worship. “Sun” is the clear highlight of this more progressive sound,
as it adds some dissonance to the riffing to create unique patterns. The sole
flaw of this style (other than it resulting in a truly schizophrenic sounding
record, [and not the Sepultura kind of schizophrenia]) is that the clean vocals
just aren’t that good. Søren Crawack does his best, but it would take a much
stronger singer to really pull off these songs. It’s frustrating because the
band does not miss the mark at all musically, but the vocals really detract
from the songs. The worst part is that Impalers actually pull off the
split-personality perfectly; much better than almost any other band could.

As a result, “The Celestial Dictator” ends
up being a record that is still great, but could be so much more. This should have
been one of the best thrash albums of the last decade. And in many spots, it
does feel that way. But the full picture is still lacking slightly. Even if the
band had only gone with their Kreator-esque sound, this would be an instant
album of the year candidate. It will still stand out as one of the stronger thrash
albums of 2017, but the squandered potential is disappointing.